A political Blog about how and why a reign of terror in West Bengal is unleashed planfully by imperialists, multinational company financed and supported Rainbow Alliance of Maoists, Naxalites,TMC, Congress, SUCI, perverted anti-Communist and anti-Leftist so-called sold-out intellectuals, corporate media and NGOs of doubtful character.

RESIST FASCIST TERROR IN WB BY TMC-MAOIST-POLICE-MEDIA NEXUS

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Tuesday, March 30, 2010

In recent times, some areas of West Bengal have witnessed activities of the ‘Maoist’ group. The group has tried to draw attention to itself through committing several grisly murders and by triggering some explosions. They are engaged in setting up ‘bases’ in the remote and relatively inaccessible locales of West Bengal that border Bihar-Jharkhand. They seek a foothold in some other districts of the state as well. A section of the corporate media has also been encouraging them, by legitimising the Maoists’ killing of CPI (M) leaders and workers in districts like Bankura, Purulia, and Midnapore west.

The CPI (M-L)-People’s War and the Maoist Communist Centre, two groups of the Naxalite persuasion, came together on 21 September 2004 to form a new party, the CPI (Maoist). As with the two erstwhile constituents, the Maoists are active in selected areas of Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, and Jharkhand. Because of the secretive style of their working, their political outlook and activities are largely unknown to the mass of the people.

The name of the CPI (Maoist) has been associated with violent acts and spreading terror. Going by their programme and ideological stand, the party is a violent anarchist outfit. Anarchy can cause harm to the democratic struggle and Left movement. The CPI (M) will counter this party politically and ideologically.

The CPI (M) formed after a long ideological debate in 1964, and a new Party Programme was adopted. Sectarian and ultra-left adventurist trends arose in the ongoing struggle against revisionism and reformism. In those years, the entire country, especially Bengal, saw mass anger against the anti-people policies of the ruling party. In particular, Bengal witnessed a massive wave of mass movements.

Following the establishment of the United Front government in 1967, the land movement, along with the movements of the workers, employees, middle class, students, youth accelerated further. A peasants’ movement was organised at Naxalbari based on the land movement and capture of state power through that movement. The CPI (M-L) formed in May 1969. In its attempts at creating ‘liberated zones’ and transforming the decade of the 1970s into the ‘decade of liberation’, the CPI (M-L) chose the CPI (M) as its target. The CPI (M) had to wage a tough political-ideological battle while under attack from the ruling Congress and the Naxalites.

The Naxalite movement splintered within the period of five years. The Naxalites split into innumerable small groups. The division and re-division went on for three decades thereafter. In the process of this disintegration, the People’s War Group (PWG) was set up in Andhra Pradesh under the tutelage of Kondapally Seetaramaiah. The PWG looked to Naxalite leader Charu Majumdar as the ‘pathfinder’. The Kanai Chatterjee-Amulya Sen- Chandrasekhar Das-led anti-Charu Majumdar group established the Maoist Communist Centre (MCC). The newly-formed CPI (Maoist) chooses to salute both Chatterjee and Majumdar as ‘great leaders’. Current imperatives have brought them together, but their documents show how from the 1980s until 2000, both the groups were at each other’s throats and the battle of attrition saw casualties pile up on both sides.

The draft programme of the CPI (Maoist) denigrates the glorious tradition of the Communist movement in India. In this, they are at one with the pracharaks of the RSS. They forget how it was the Communists who first raised the slogan of complete independence in India. The Communist movement had called for the inclusion of the socio-economic content to the call for swaraj. The Communists had also been deeply involved in building up a mass base among the people. The Communist movement was severely repressed, and the colonial rulers brought a series of conspiracy cases— Meerut, Kanpur, and Peshawar—against Communists. The Communist Party had also been in the vanguard of building up an anti-imperialist movement in India. The Maoists would have us believe that the ‘betrayal’ by the communists in British India had prevented a revolution although the ‘revolutionary content was present then’. We may only note that the Maoists have declared that they do not form part of the Communist movement in India; this is a bit of unexpected self-revelation that shows them up in proper light.

WHAT IS BEING TOUTED AS ‘MAOISM’?

There is no doubt that Mao Zedong is one of greatest revolutionary leaders of the twentieth century. Under his leadership, the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the mass of the people organised a democratic revolution in that backward country and started the work of socialist construction. New democracy or people’s democracy meant a link between the democratic and the socialist revolutions, the basis of which was the leadership of the working class and a worker-peasant unity. In advancing the various stages of the Chinese revolution, Mao had implemented the principles of Marxism-Leninism in the specific conditions prevailing in China. In particular, Mao had explained analytically the dialectical materialism of Marx, helping the CPC to take the correct stand in the different phases of the Chinese revolution. Despite the admitted errors of the Great Leap Forward, Mao had led from the front the task of socialist construction in China.

What is ‘Maoism’? It is a totally incorrect concept and reeks of motivation. It is an attempt to separate the theory and implementation of Mao from the classical and developing stream of Marxism-Leninism. The term ‘Maoism’ is utilised by those who stand opposed to the CPC as well as by the bourgeois ‘Marxologists’ who use the term ‘Stalinism’ in an equally jeering fashion.

In the so-called Lin Biao Congress, or the 9th Congress of the CPC (April 1969), a touchstone for the Maoists, it was declared that the CPC believes Marxism-Leninism-Mao Zedong Thought as the theoretical and directional basis. One should note that even by the adulating Lin, the word used was not ‘Maoism’ but Mao Zedong Thought. Mao Zedong Thought was defined at the CPC Congress as the theoretical coordination of the reality and practice of the Chinese Revolution with the universal principles of Marxism-Leninism. The theoretical basis for this is erroneous. Characterising Mao Zedong Thought as the Marxism-Leninism of an era when imperialism has been ‘destroyed’ and when socialism ‘has made worldwide progress’, is not an objective evaluation. It was, among other things, an attempt to impose on the world situation the specific experience of socialist reconstruction in China. In fact, this kind of an attempt ends up negating the most notable features of Mao’s own thinking and his mode of functioning. Mao certainly enriched Marxism- Leninism through his thought and practice, but it would not be correct to say that he brought up Marxism-Leninism to a ‘completely new stage’. It was under Lin’s tenure as General Secretary of the CPC that Mao’s theorising was turned into philosophical precepts and adored. Notably though, it was the CPC central committee under Mao which later criticised Lin for his activities.

A wide attack on the precepts of the 9th CPC Congress is found in the address delivered at the 30th anniversary of the formation of the People’s Republic of China by CPC vice-president Marshall Jianying. He said that the CPC and the people of China regarded the application and development of Marxism-Leninism in the Chinese revolution as Mao Zedong Thought. He went on to say that Mao Zedong Thought was not the product of Mao’s personal wisdom; it represented the crystallisation of the experience of fifty years of the revolutionary struggle in China; it also represented the crystallisation of the common wisdom of the CPC. He pointed out that during the ‘Cultural Revolution, they turned the relationship between the subjective and the objective, between the mind and the matter upside down’. Similarly, ‘they passed off idealism and metaphysics as materialism and dialectics, historical idealism as historical materialism, and their utterly ridiculous pseudo-socialism as scientific socialism’.

The sixth plenary session of the eleventh central committee noted that Mao Zedong Thought which came into being through the collective struggle of the Party and the people, was the guiding ideology of the Party; ‘Mao Zedong Thought is the integration of the universal principles of Marxism- Leninism with the concrete practice of the Chinese revolution’. The document militates against the attempt to universalise Mao Zedong Thought. The report mentions repeatedly the specificity of the Chinese situation and the Chinese experience.

Maoists, whether in Peru, Nepal, or India, never seem to get over this habit of gathering together sayings of Mao Zedong and treating them as universal principles. They also alienate the people with the slogan ‘China’s chairman is our chairman’. No Communist Party that recognises the term Mao Zedong Thought, and, like the CPI (M), recognises the need to draw the correct lessons from Mao’s historic role, talks about ‘Maoism’.

After 31 years of the formation of the MCC, the term ‘Maoism’ was adopted by the CPI (Maoist) ‘amidst great debate and controversy’, according to Kisan, a leader of the party (People’s March, 7 November 2004). He believes Maoism to be the third and higher stage in the qualitative development of Marxism.

Let us now see what Pushpa Kumar Dahal (a k a Prachanda) has to say about ‘Maoism’ (On Maoism). According to him, Mao Zedong ‘thought’ is confusing: Maoism is ‘scientific’. Inter alia, Prachanda talks about such inanities as Mao having identified (presumably as an original contribution) class struggle, struggle for production, and scientific experimentation.

According to Prachanda, Mao Zedong brought philosophy out of the reading room of philosophers and spoke of necessity of making it a massive and real power. Is Prachanda not familiar with Marx’s eleventh thesis on Feurbach?

Does he consider Lenin to be a philosopher confined to reading rooms? Then again, Prachanda accredits Mao Zedong with having uniquely contributed to history through his destruction of Chinese feudalism by giving land to the peasant, and of nationalising foreign and Chinese monopoly financial institutions, and for his control over private capital. Prachanda cites Mao’s slogans—‘barrel of the rifle is the source of power’, ‘imperialism is a paper tiger’—plus his concept of the people’s war as original contributions to the growth of scientific socialism. These are clearly comments of a person who understands neither the practice nor the breadth of Mao’s thinking.

Indeed, the Maoists seem to be obsessed with armed activities that inevitably result in individual terror and annihilation. The slogan of ‘people’s war’ generates a lot of verbosity, but ignores socio-economic analysis and political activities. ‘Maoism’ has been created to allow the selective use of Mao’s sayings on military science and guerrilla warfare out of context and without a logical analytical framework.

A CONFUSED VIEW OF THE WORLD SITUATION

One of the principal issues before a Communist Party is its outlook on the world situation towards formation of its strategy. The Maoists fare extremely poorly in this regard. In the draft document of February 2005, they devote only a few lines in their confused and confusing analysis of the world situation. They denigrate the Soviet Union for its ‘deterioration into a capitalist country’, and deal with what they call ‘proxy war with the USA’ in which ‘millions lost their lives’.

The CPI (M) has identified throughout the 1960s the 1970s and specifically in at the 14th Party Congress the lacunae in the socialist construction in the erstwhile Soviet Union. The CPI (M), however, does not believe that in the 1960s the Soviet Union had turned into a capitalist country. In its role in the world situation, the Soviet Union stood by the newly independent nations; its nuclear capabilities were used for the cause of peace, not war. It is US imperialism that had carried on ‘proxy wars’ in the Third World to clamp down its hegemony; the US used the debacle of socialism in the Soviet Union to build a new world order. Do the Maoists seek to shield US imperialism by lambasting the Soviet Union out of context?

Interestingly enough, the Maoists do not consider the contra-diction between the forces of socialism and those of imperialism to be a core contradiction. By doing this, the Maoists ignore and deny the transition from capitalism to socialism. They also characterise, out of context, the People’s Republic of China as a ‘capitalist country after the death of Mao’, and turn a blind eye to the process of socialist construction in Vietnam, Cuba, and Democratic Korea.

The puerile nature of the analysis of the world situation in the Maoists’ document is glaringly apparent. Kisan writes simplistically that the world situation is replete with revolutionary possibilities in an unprecedented manner, because imperialism is in deep crisis and revolution is the principal trend in the world. Imperialism is always shadowed by crisis, and it is true that anti-imperialist movements have grown around the world. However, to deny the need for conducting anti-imperialist struggles with greater fervour reeks of the anarchism of the 1970s, when the Naxalites used to speak in the same vein as do their Maoist successors today.

CHARACTER OF THE INDIAN STATE INCORRECTLY POSITED

The Maoists would characterise the Indian state, which it sees as having gained sham independence in 1947, as semi-colonial and semi-feudal, and controlled by the forces of imperialism. They characterise the big bourgeoisie as ‘comprador bureaucratic bourgeoisie’ who have an understanding with the big landlord class who dominate the rural areas. According to the Maoists, the Indian revolution can be characterised as ‘new democratic revolution’ although they also talk of the Indian revolution as ‘nationalist revolution’.

Their aim is to make India independent, self-reliant, and democratic.

This is confusion of the worst order.

The 6th Congress of the Comintern defined comprador bourgeoisie those who subserve imperialism by exporting raw materials and importing finished products from imperialist countries. It is not possible to characterise the Indian big bourgeoisie as comprador as per this definition. The process of capitalist accumulation in India and the foundation of the industrial base of the country are conveniently ignored by the Maoists in their hurry to prove that India continues to be a dependent country.

Mao Zedong himself defined the Chinese comprador bourgeoisie as the class, which directly subserve imperialism and which is nurtured by imperialism. By this definition, the Indian big bourgeoisie cannot be defined as comprador. The CPI (M) believes that the big Indian bourgeoisie goes in for dual relationship of struggle and entente with imperialism as per the dictates of their class interests. The state sector, devoid of socialist content, has nevertheless been a factor in laying the technical-industrial base and helped in lessening dependence on imperialism. Later, especially from the 1980s, the big bourgeoisie took advantage of the commencement of liberalization and started to eat into the state sector, even in core areas.

It is wrong to claim that the policy of liberalisation was put in place because the Indian big bourgeoisie were comprador. The big bourgeoisie have joined hands with imperialism and international finance capital based on their strength, not weakness. The big bourgeoisie, who lead the Indian ruling classes, form the principal target of the democratic revolution. The Maoists stand that seeks to weaken the position of the big bourgeoisie would hinder and not help the struggle against the big bourgeoisie.

The Maoists think that India is yet to gain independence and that we have a semi-colonial state in a neo-colonial set up. They carefully avoid the term ‘Indian state’ while indulging in their theorising. The CPI (M) does not believe that in practice, as of now, the forces of imperialism control the Indian economy and the administration. While such an attempt may be going on, the Indian big bourgeoisie is far from comprador. If the Maoists are to be believed, however, everyone in India has turned into lackeys of imperialism— the only exception, as ever, are the Maoists themselves!

This is of a piece with the other erroneous understanding—that India is not independent. The forces of imperialism have continued with their efforts to interfere with the policy making of Third World countries. Nevertheless, it would be simplistic and downright incorrect to conclude that the post-Second World War newly independent countries remain devoid of independence. The political independence in these countries has not been transformed into comprehensive sovereignty of the people because of the domination of the bourgeoisie. However, it would not do to hold the simplistic view that the Third World countries remain devoid of independence. It is a wrong formulation on the part of the Maoists.

‘THE CHINESE PATH’: AN ARTIFICIAL CONSTRUCT

Ignoring Mao Zedong’s postulate that the Chinese Revolution was a combination of the principle of Marxism-Leninism with the evolving reality of China, the Maoists talk of the Indian revolution following the Chinese path.

They insist on aping the model followed in pre-Revolution China. The Maoists need to learn not just the history of pre-Revolution China but also the Indian reality. Revolution can hardly be cloned from country to country. Stalin had pointed out how theory becomes useless, devoid of practice.

Mao himself called such a deviation ‘seeking to catch the sparrow with the eyes closed’. There are differences between the Chinese situation and the Indian reality. Apart from the differences existing in the unfolding of the colonial heritage of the two countries, differences exist in the realm of economy, political structure, and growth. The Maoists, by invoking pre- Revolution China as India’s model patently ignore history. The Maoists would do worse than paying heed to the dictum of Mao Zedong during the height of the Sino-Soviet debate in 1960.

Mao had argued, in effect, that the party which was not able to analyse the situation evolving in its own country and would rather emulate experiences of another country without analysis was a hotchpotch of revisionism and sectarianism, and would never be regarded as a party driven by the principles of Marxism-Leninism. The CPI (M) believes that it would not do to mechanically follow the revolutionary experience of other countries without a scientific analysis, something that the Maoists revel in doing. One recalls that during the 1970s, the CPC had criticised the Naxalites for raising the slogan of ‘China’s Chairman in our Chairman’, and thoughtlessly using such terms as ‘liberated zones’ in the Indian context. The Maoists do not learn from history, even from the party of Mao!

IGNORANCE ABOUT THE ELEMENT OF CLASS STRUGGLE IN THE PARLIAMENTARY SYSTEM

Lenin had long ago characterised the parliamentary system as a scene of class struggle. Entangled in the web of what Lenin called ‘left-wing communism’, the Maoists deny India bourgeois democracy and dub as illusions institutions such as the parliament, assemblies, panchayats, and the entire electoral procedure. Their view is erroneous, lop-sided, and self-contradictory.

Marxists know that the character of class domination defines a State and its political character. The CPI (M) has the programmatic understanding that the Indian State represents a class rule of the big bourgeoisie and the big landlords, led by the former who indulge in cooperation with international finance capital.

In India, the bourgeois democratic revolution remains unfinished and the task is to establish real democracy. Yet, the fact can never be ignored that the parliamentary system has been a sign of progress for the masses in the sense that it has acted as a weapon for the extension of the democratic rights of the people. The democratic rights won have been the result of ceaseless struggle and do not represent gifts from above. Waves of popular struggles have overcome authoritarianism of the 1970s, the ousting of democratic governments, the clamping down of internal emergency, and the inroads of communal forces in government.

In countering the false claim of the Maoists that the parliamentary system is a complete illusion, one needs to point out that in a capitalist society, as Lenin had pointed, the parliamentary forum affords the communists opportunities to expose the system of capitalism. In addition, it would be downright foolhardy not to take full advantage of the opportunities afforded by the parliamentary structure and to further the struggle in and out of parliament. Elections are called electoral struggle because in the process, millions of people take part and the opportunity is created to expose the role played by the State, bourgeois politics, and the bourgeois parties. An opportunity is created to pull the people out of the fold of the bourgeois parties. However, as the CPI (M) has maintained consistently, the extra parliamentary struggle cannot be supplanted by the parliamentary struggle, but has to be supplemented by it.

Why do the Maoists think, and on what objective basis, that the masses remain inert witnesses in the arena of parliamentary struggle? Why cannot the Maoists recall Lenin’s saying that participation in the bourgeois democratic parliamentary system would go a long way in exposing the system before the masses and convincing them of the necessity for its removal. Will the Maoists learn from history?

STAYING AWAY FROM THE DAILY STRUGGLES OF THE PEOPLE

Declaring that there remained no alternative before a revolutionary party other than conduct of long-standing and armed people’s war towards an armed peasant revolution, the Maoists talk only of guerrilla warfare, liberated zones, headquarters, capturing cities and identify these tasks as the only worthwhile revolutionary tasks. They aim, through performing these tasks, to capture state power.

The Maoists give great attention to military strategy and military tactics.

They have, however, no time to spare for the task of enhancing the political consciousness of the people and of uniting them on the questions concerning politics, economy, and society. They ignore the importance of the trade union movement and the role the movement plays in enhancing the class-consciousness of the workers. Would they also turn their faces away from the land movement on the plea that without the completion of the democratic revolution, such movements would not lead to comprehensive land reforms?

How then do they propose to make the teeming million of India conscious, sans movements that stand opposed to the bourgeois-landlord policies, of the need for fundamental changes? Reliance on the armed might of a minuscule part of the people is Blanquism of the worst kind.

Mao Zedong wrote that the Communists must never be isolated from the majority of the people and must take cognizance of the total situation. The Maoists would fulminate against international finance capital but would not take part in the actual struggle taking place against it across the country, a struggle in which the CPI (M), other Left parties, and the TUs have played a stellar role. The Maoists have stayed away from the struggle—to what purpose? In People’s March, Kisan has confessed that the Maoists have not been able to build up struggle against the forces of imperialism, neither in the rural areas not in the cities and towns.

The confession reminds us of another confession by Charu Majumdar when he had lamented back in 1972 in a letter written to his wife that the involvement with the policy of annihilation, the anti-imperialist struggle had suffered. Kisan has also regretted the fact that the Maoists could not organize adequate response to the onslaught of the forces of communalism, in the struggle in which the CPI (M) and the Left parties play a commendable role.

DISTORTED EXPOSITION OF GUERRILLA WARFARE

In the worldview of the Maoists, democratic struggle and mass-political programmes have no place. They believe that the entire struggle of the new democratic revolution would be armed struggle with the guerrilla forces building up red bastions in the villages. They have devoted the bulk of the space in their document on the strategy and tactics of the Indian revolution to such guerrilla actions. It was the subsequently discredited CPC leader, Lin Biao, who had first propounded the theory that the Maoists have embraced.

Lin had spoken of encircling the cities (i.e., the developed countries) by the villages (i.e., the developing world). Lin had also spoken of Mao’s annihilation theory against the Japanese occupation army to mean that such action was necessary for the armed peasant revolution to succeed in the Third World.

The Naxalites had lapped the theory up and were later being cautioned by the CPC about misinterpreting the annihilation theory and taking it out of context (and this was admitted by several Naxalite leaders of the 1970s in a published document).

The revolutionary path can never be one of conspiracy minus the objective and subjective conditions; there is no alchemy (as Marx noted in 1850) to bring about revolution. Making conspiracy the chief implement to bring about revolution is a sectarian and self-defeating notion. The Maoists are verily prey to this idea and in an obsessive manner.

It devolves on the Party of the working class to bring within its capabilities the entire range of complexities existing in the country where the revolutionary struggle is to be launched. It must also bring together as many allies as possible. The notions of united front and coalition rise out of this consideration. Lenin points out that there is need for a revolutionary party to bring into the fold mass allies out of the fold of the bourgeoisie even if such allies are politically restless and are unfaithful, and offer only conditional support. To deny this is, according to Lenin, a form of crass failure to grasp the basic principles of scientific socialism. The Maoists are certainly victims to this folly. They are not able to understand the tiniest iota of the revolutionary path.

The Maoists appear obsessed with guerrilla warfare. We point out for their edification the conceptual framework on the same theme by Lenin. Lenin wrote that no party of the proletariat could consider guerrilla warfare the only path to adhere to. The guerrilla warfare must subserve the other modes of struggle and it must be enriched through a drive to advance the Socialist perception and organisation. The point to note is that Lenin had underlined this thesis in the case of every form of struggle, whether through strikes, through parliamentary form, or through newspapers.

Lenin explains that in a departure from the old forms of ‘socialism’, Marxism recognises the variegated forms of struggle, but the Maoists comprehensively reject this thesis. Their doings have inevitably created alienation from the mass of the people. The own initiative of the masses has suffered. This is the result of not attaching due importance to mass-political initiative.

Lenin is uncompromising in insisting that Marxism demands historical consideration while pondering the form of struggle. Any aberration here, Lenin pointed out, was a deviation from the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism. Lenin said that ‘to attempt to answer yes or no to the question whether any particular means of struggle should be used, without making a detailed examination of the concrete situation of the given movement at the given stage of its development, means completely to abandon the Marxist position’. This is something the Maoists are squarely guilty of all the way. Marxism does not approve of the ‘thesis’ that guerrilla warfare is the only viable path during the period of revolution, and that all other paths are unimportant and irrelevant.

Mao had identified the conditions and conditionalities in China for the unleashing of armed peasant revolution and of armed revolutionary zones.

These are:

• In capitalist countries, the workers build up their strength through overt and ‘legal’ struggles while educating themselves; they advance through utilisation of such fora as legal struggles, parliament, and political and economic strike actions.

In China, there was no parliament, and no scope for utilising a legal forum.

• The peasant economy of China was ‘localised’.

• With a low degree of capitalist development, China did not experience a unified, countrywide capitalist economy.

• Warlords remained isolated and engaged in warfare with other warlords.

• With the imperialist forces slicing up China for control, there were frequent inter-imperialist clashes in China.

• There was lack of central political command in China and thus there was a lack of concomitant control in the administration and the army.

Considering the reality prevailing in India, the attempt to build up ‘bases’ in remote villages, to set up ‘liberated zones’, and to encircle cities is pure fantasy. How to deal with the central political authority and the powerful army in the course of striving for a revolutionary social transformation does not concern the Maoists. They do not see whether there are any circumstances which are compatible with the concept of armed struggle based on guerrilla warfare. None of the features like the capitalist development in India, the connectivity with the world economy, the experience of parliamentary democracy, socio-economic changes, the social position of the classes, the consciousness and lifestyle of the Indian people, the development of ideological instruments and media—are suited to guerrilla warfare on the basis of liberated zones.

Despite the weaknesses of mass struggles, advances have been registered in the case of both the urban and rural working classes and their organisations. Marxists regard momentum as the life force of matter.

Considering the changes wrought in the Indian economy, society, politics, and politics, it would not be difficult to understand that the so-called ‘guerrilla tactics’ can create not permanent but transient flashes and can end up by harming the potential of greater mobilisation of forces and of greater struggles.

In his treatise On Practice, Mao Zedong wrote:

“We are opposed to diehards in the revolutionary ranks whose thinking fails to advance with changing objective circumstances and has manifested itself historically as Right opportunism’. ‘Their thinking is divorced from social practice, and they cannot march ahead to guide the chariot of society; they simply train behind, grumbling that it goes too fast and trying to drag it back or turn it in the opposite direction’.

The Maoist documents available with us describe the method of creating ‘favourable circumstances’. They rely on the inner contradiction of the imperialist forces impacting the Indian ruling classes, creating political uncertainty and weakening administration. This will, according to the Maoists, lead to mass uprisings against the ‘comprador ruling classes’ and the police and the army will be affected. This, in turn, would lead to world war! If this is not day dreaming, what is?

CPI (M), in its Programme, has said:

The struggle to realise the aims of the people’s democratic revolution through the revolutionary unity of all patriotic and democratic forces with the workers-peasants alliance at its core, is a complicated and a protracted one. It is to be waged in varying conditions in varying phases. Different classes, different strata within the same class, are bound to take different positions in these distinct phases of the development of the revolutionary movement. Only a strong Communist Party, which develops the mass movements and utilises appropriate united front tactics to achieve the strategic objective, can make use of these shifts and draw into its ranks these sections. Only such a party bringing within its fold the most sincere and sacrificing revolutionaries would be able to lead the mass of the people through the various twists and turns that are bound to take place in the course of the revolutionary movement. (Art 7.16)

The CPI (M) believes that the flourishing and development of mass-revolutionary struggle is the primary task at this stage. To a true Marxist, simply making loud proclamations of armed struggle can never become a pre-condition for establishing one’s revolutionary credentials. Since neither the working class nor the working masses would go in for violence on their own, what should be the stand of the Party of the working class?

The CPI (M) Programme notes:

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) strives to achieve the establishment of people’s democracy and socialist transformation through peaceful means. By developing a powerful mass revolutionary movement, by combining parliamentary and extra-parliamentary struggle, the working class and its allies will try their utmost to overcome the resistance of the forces of reaction and to bring about these transformations through peaceful means. However, it needs always to be borne in mind that the ruling classes never relinquish their power voluntarily. They seek to defy the will of the people and seek to reverse it by lawlessness and violence. It is, therefore, necessary for the revolutionary forces to be vigilant and so orient their work that they can face up to all contingencies, to any twist and turn in the political life of the country. (Art 7.18)

THE REALITY

The Maoists guerrillas have stated that their task comprises providing encouragement to the masses for taking part in ‘political and military programmes, including sabotage and annihilation of enemies’. The results are there for everybody to see.

Right from the earliest days of the Naxalite movement, the line of individual assassination has been adopted as a policy by the left sectarians.

One has to pause and recall that on the eve of the arrest of Charu Majumdar, six Naxalite leaders, including Kanu Sanyal, Sourin Bose, C. Tejeswar Rao, and D. Nagabhusan Pattanayak, confessed that the CPC took great exception to the line of annihilation of the Naxalites. (This confession was later published in November 1972.) The CPC accused the Naxalites of mechanically following the people’s war theory of Lin Biao, and pointed out that dipping the hand in the blood of a class enemy did not make a revolutionary Communist; on the other hand, it will ensure that the Party was no longer a Communist Party.

The left sectarians, including the PWG, the MCC and the CPI (Maoist), have indulged in mayhem over the years. Between 1991 and 2001, 2,077 people, mostly ordinary citizens, were killed in Naxalite-related violence. The method of killing is gruesome with people being burnt alive or smashed into smithereens by exploding crude or sophisticated devices.

In 2002, the Maoists killed 90 people, in 2003 the figure reads 136, in 2004 it was 70, and in 2005, 122. Despite the Maoists’ penchant for identifying persons as ‘police informers’ before killing them, 80 per cent of those killed by them represented ordinary people who are not class enemies, even by Maoists criteria. Some of those killed were in fact members or supporters of rival Naxalite groups; this was internecine struggle, pure and simple.

In Bengal, the Maoists’ forays include killing 12 CPI (M) workers and 17 police personnel. They have also exploded landmines, destroyed isolated buildings in remote areas, and have tried to spread terror among the village folk. Spreading thinly across the borders of Orissa, Chhattisgarh, MadhyaPradesh, Karnataka, and Maharashtra, the Maoists have concentrated chiefly if not solely on spreading terror and causing mayhem in the name of ‘revolutionary ways’. They prefer if they can to build up contiguous areas as ‘zones’ in the areas where they operate.

Lately the rate of attrition among the left sectarian elements has been notable. In Andhra Pradesh, the rate of surrender by the PWG averaged over 550 per year. The decimation was also evident in Bihar and Jharkhand.

The Maoists utilise the increase of Maoist activities in neighbouring Nepal and the formation of a coordination committee of the South Asian Maoists to strengthen their terror tactics. They use the long and unguarded border between Bihar and Nepal to bring in illegal arms and to run training camps on both sides of the border. They keep in close touch with extremist outfits of Kashmir, the northeast India, and the LTTE from whom they get help with arms training. They may even have, as per reports published in the media in November 2004, links with the ISI of Pakistan.

However, the net political impact of the Maoists activities is very marginal and transient. For example, in Bihar and Jharkhand, ceiling surplus was neither taken away from the landlords nor redistributed among the landless and the rural poor. The chief source of income of the Maoists in the rural stretches is extracting levy from the landlords and the nouveux rich of the villages. They appear far from interested in protecting the interests of the rural poor or in preserving natural resources.

On the other hand, the Maoists are linked to a large and widening network of dishonest traders and businessmen. In Chhattisgarh and in Orissa, the villagers have clashed repeatedly with the Maoists who are involved in racketeering of forest resources including tendu leaves and babui fibres.

Using the power of the gun to establish sway over villages and villagers, the Maoists have effectively become a source not of inspiration but of fear for the rural people. The shotgun justice of the Maoists’ mass courts is well documented.

The Maoists have also increasingly become the handmaiden of the bourgeois political parties. The Naxalite poet Varavara Rao has confessed before the advocates’ committee about the links that the Maoists have with the Telugu Desam Party at the local level in particular. He has also said that both the Telugu Desam and the Congress have utilised the ‘services’ of the Maoists in exchange for lucre.

It was recently disclosed that a minister in the BJP-run Munda government in Jharkhand put to use the Maoists to win elections in exchange for a considerable sum of money. In Bihar, the adage goes that those who represent bourgeois parties during the daylight are Maoists by the night. The confession of a former state secretary of the PWG about the outfit being in hand-in-glove with the Trinamul Congress is another case in point in this regard.

DEVELOPMENTAL PERSPECTIVE

A running theme of the corporate media is that the Maoists could gain ground in Bengal because of lack of development. Each dastardly murder committed by the Maoists is being justified on the basis of ‘lack of development’.

A look at the Maoist documents will make it amply clear that they remain in the villages not because they are determined to work for the interests of the tribal people and the rural masses. They have chosen the areas precisely because it suits their ‘terrain theory’ of guerrilla warfare. The calculation is to utilise the isolated nature of the terrain to carry out terroristic acts.

The Maoist documents spell out how they do not believe in development within the existing framework and they are also firm in their conviction that any slogan of ‘partial development’ for the poorer section of the rural masses is revisionist and a betrayal of the revolution. They also claim that to raise the slogan of development without armed might is to placate the ruling classes as their lackeys.

The principal aim of the corporate media in focussing attention on growth is to deny the rural growth and expansion under the Left Front government.

To the bourgeois media, development means the widening of the scope for a luxurious lifestyle for the thin layer of the rich and the super rich. To the corporate media, then, the rise in the purchasing power of the capitalist, the top layer of the middles class, and the nouveux rich of the rural belts represent development. The CPI (M) has a class outlook on development in the evolving socio-economic reality.

The struggle for development to us denotes the struggle waged by the mass of the people of the country for improvement in their standard of living.

The question of development loses significance devoid of issues related to land reforms, redistribution of rural resources, wage, employment, education, and health. The CPI (M) has been carrying forward the struggle for development within the restrictions imposed by the bourgeois-landlord framework. Another countervailing factor has been the present stage of globalisation. Yet it is important to struggle for development because it is the Communist Party that can be the real ally of the masses in the struggle for a better life, and to increase the window of minimum opportunity.

The programme of the CPI (M) has made it clear that the ‘Party will utilise the opportunities that present themselves of bringing into existence governments pledged to carry out a programme of providing relief to the people and strive to project and implement alternative policies within the existing limitations’.

The developmental perspective of the Left Front government has resulted in 15 lakh rural landless getting land. Five lakh families who have received land and patta documents belong to the scheduled tribes. The right of the sharecropper is well established here. The role of the panchayats has seen the correlation of forces in the rural belts change. In the urban areas, the right of the workers, the bustee dwellers, and the employees-middle class has been extended to the extent it is possible to do so. The Left Front government has progressed while establishing the difference it has in the policy outlook vis-à-vis other state governments.

However, no one should labour under the illusion that in circumstances nationwide where the evil effects of the capitalist economic system and of liberalisation mount every day, this state will remain free of the adversities just because there is a Left Front government in office. The document entitled ‘Left Front Government and Our Tasks’ adopted at the 21st State Conference of the CPI (M) states that in the backdrop of the national scenario, the generation of income in the districts has fallen behind that of Kolkata and its neighbourhood. 4,612 villages have been identified as very backward. 46 lakh people live in great poverty.

The document also notes how unemployment has become a serious and worrying issue. In the rural areas, thus, the number of the landless goes on increasing. The agricultural production has gone down compared to the 1980s and the 1990s. The scheduled tribes and scheduled castes belong to the poorest sections of the people in the rural areas. Malnutrition in the rural areas is a worry. In 18 per cent of the villages, supply of potable water could not be arranged.

To tackle the situation, the Left Front government has brought about changes in the priority of policy and implementation. The work of developing the backward areas is being given additional stress. The development of education, health, and self-reliance has been given the shape and character of mass drives. Industrialisation is viewed in the perspective of employment generation.

The CPI (M) never loses the perspective that development is an integral part of class struggle, and that it plays an active role in changing the correlation of class forces.

Involved in day-to-day activities of a developmental nature, the CPI (M) never shies away from identifying its points of weaknesses in order to enhance its class-conscious initiative. The Maoists are never willing to do this because of the nature of politics they cling fatuously to. They stand against developmental work, especially in the backward areas. They militate against the setting up of roads, water supply, health centres, and child education centres. They use explosives and guns to prevent development from happening. They swim against the tide, isolated and alienated from the masses. They want to encroach on forest resources from a purely commercially exploitative point of view. They fear that development will sweep away their pockets of isolated ‘terrain’. The difference between the CPI (M) and the CPI (Maoist) is one of politics, and the question of development is a part of it.

The Maoists are a part of the social unrest generated by contemporary capitalism. The unrest is ideologically in favour of the status quo although in its outer exposition, it spreads anti-status quo thoughts and concepts. In these times, adventurism, extreme right reaction based on nationality and religion groups, terrorist activities, and anarchism can appear in various forms. Dialectically, and ideologically, all this emanates from contemporary capitalism. Each of these phenomena shares the same class basis. Rather than from the class-conscious struggles of working class, they emerge out of the petty bourgeois class compulsions. Thus Lenin:

A petty bourgeois driven to frenzy by the horrors of capitalism is a social phenomenon which, like anarchism, is characteristic of all capitalist countries.

The instability of such revolutionism, its barrenness, and its tendency to turn rapidly into submission, apathy, phantasms, and even a frenzied infatuation with one bourgeois fad or another—all this is common knowledge. However, a theoretical or abstract recognition of these truths does not at all rid revolutionary parties of old errors, which always crop up at unexpected occasions, in somewhat new forms, in a hitherto unfamiliar garb or surroundings, in an unusual—a more or less unusual—situation.

Monday, March 29, 2010

Suspected Maoists reportedly set afire a nursery located deep inside San Gurundia forest of Tamra range under Bonai forest division late last night. However, Gurundia police said it was not an act of the Maoists.

Local sources claimed a group of around 30 Maoists set ablaze the nursery and the fence of dried twigs. No Forest official was present at that time. Tamra forest range is contiguous to Naxal-hit forest stretches of Deogarh and Sambalpur districts. Gurundia IIC Kuber Bariha said it appeared to be an act of mischief-mongers and pointed out that there was no ‘Red’ poster to suggest presence of Maoists.

A salary of Rs 3,000 and a cut of the extortion money is being given to the cadre by Maoists to attract more unemployed youths into their armed fight. According to officials, this strategy of Maoists has led to unemployed youngsters hailing from backward areas joining the movement. Home Ministry official said, “It is a matter of concern. Acute poverty coupled with lack of job opportunities is turning many youths to Naxalism. They get Rs 3,000 as monthly remuneration and a cut of the extortion money they collect.” It is learned that the Maoists extort money annually to the tune of Rs 1,400 crore. They operate in the mineral-rich areas where many industries are located. Fearing the extremist group many of the industries, contractors, businessmen, and also some of the government officials give extortion money to them in the area. Home Secretary Gopal K Pillai recently said, “They can now bring many sectors of Indian economy to their knees. But they don’t want to do it today. They know that if they do that now, the state will come very hard on them. They are not fully prepared to face the onslaught of the state machinery. So, they would rather go very slowly.” 34 districts in 8 states has been taken by the government as focus areas. In all these areas there has been high incidences of Naxal violence. Apart from this, the Home Ministry is also building up capacity in the state police forces in the areas and helping them with deployment of central forces along with sharing intelligence, training support and inter-state coordination. In the past 6 months the security forces have taken control of around 4,000 sq km area from Naxals and civil administration has been restored there.

Sunday, March 28, 2010

THE CPI (M) OFFICE AT JHARGRAM TOWN LOOTED AND PLUNDERED BY THE RAINBOW ALLIANCE OF MAOIST-TMC-CONGRESS-SUCI UNDER MAMATA BANERJEE ON 18-03-2010 WITH THE BLESSINGS OF MEDHA PATKAR, ARUNDHATI ROY, MAHASWETA DEVI AND OTHER SO-CALLED INTELLECTUALS WHO ARE ON THE PAY ROLL OF CORPORATE MEDIA AND IMPERIALISTS

BRINDA KARAT AND OTHER WOMEN LEADERS CELEBRATE OVER THE PASSING OF THE WOMENS' RESERVATION BILL IN THE RAJYA SABHA ON 09-03-2010 IN THE FACE OF STIFF OPPOSITION FROM MAMATA BANERJEE, MULAYAM SINGH YADAV, LALOO PRASAD YADAV AND OTHER ANTI-WOMEN LEADERS

"ANANDA BAZAR PATRIKA" HAS PUBLISHED A PHOTOGRAPH OF AN UNIDENTIFIED ARMED GOON IN ITS SOUTH BENGAL EDITION ON 27-03-2010. THE CRIMINAL IS ACTUALLY A TMC WORKER NAMED SK. GOPAL OF GHOLADIGDUI OF PURSURA IN HOOGHLY DISTRICT. "ANANDA BAZAR PATRIKA" INTENTIONALLY DID NOT DISCLOSE HIS IDENTITY TO MALIGN THE CPI (M).

Saturday, March 27, 2010

After rejecting all demands for a judicial inquiry for over five months, the Rajiv Gandhi finally appointed a Commission in April 1985 under the chairmanship of a sitting Supreme Court judge Ranganath Misra. According to its terms of reference, the object of the Misra Commission was to inquire into “the allegations in regard to the incidents of organised violence” which took place in Delhi. Misra interpreted this to mean that his job was only to find out whether the violence in Delhi was organised or not. His finding was that the violence was initially spontaneous and, as the police failed to act promptly, anti-social elements took over and organised the carnage that followed. Misra did not however identify those anti-social elements, much less did he explain why the police either failed to act against them or in several cases even colluded with them. The Commission categorically ruled out the possibility of the Congress Party and the Rajiv Gandhi Government having a hand in the holocaust.

The only political involvement Misra conceded was that Congress workers had on their own participated in the violence.

It did not seem to matter much to the Misra Commission that its findings were hardly convincing. The report is breathtaking crude in its reasoning and vindicates the apprehensions that led the Citizens Justice Committee, the main representative of the victims, to withdraw from the Commission’s proceedings at an advanced stage. A subsequent Congress Government headed by P.V. Narasimha Rao, who was home minister during the carnage, rewarded Misra by appointing him the first chairman of (all the things) the National Human Rights Commission. Later, Misra himself put a question mark over the integrity of his inquiry by joining the Congress party and becoming its Rajya Sabha member. About two years ago, Parliament sought to atone for all these sordid happenings by passing a unanimous resolution in support of the Vajpayee Government’s decision to order a fresh judicial inquiry into the 1984 carnage in the form of the Justice G.T. Nanavati Commission. Here are a few frequently asked questions about the cover-up of the massacre by the Misra Commission.

(1) Why did the Citizens Justice Committee withdraw from the proceedings of the Misra Commission at an advanced stage?

(a) There were several reasons why the CJC felt compelled to withdraw from the proceedings. The most important reason was the Commission’s overweening concern for secrecy. Misra approached the inquiry with a pre-determination to hold all the proceedings in camera. One of the rules of procedure he framed right at the beginning said that the proceedings would be held in camera “unless directed otherwise.” This is in contrast to the normal practice of holding an inquiry in public to ensure that justice is not only done but also seems to be done. As if the idea of shutting out the public was not bad enough, Misra excluded even the CJC from more and more areas of the inquiry. The CJC estimated that more than three-fourth of the inquiry was kept out of its reach. Misra’s secretive methods, rather uncharacteristic for a judge, betrayed his anxiety to give a clean chit to the Rajiv Gandhi Government and Congress leaders. The last straw was Misra’s announcement at an advanced stage of the inquiry that there was no need to summon any of the dignitaries the CJC wanted to question because he had already examined most of them in the privacy of his chamber. In its 18-page submission announcing its withdrawal from the inquiry on March 31, 1986, the CJC evocatively described that innovation of Misra as “an in camera inquiry within an in camera inquiry.”

(2) Why did the Misra Commission not permit the Citizens Justice Committee to cross examine the persons in authority during the massacre?

(a) Take the nine dignitaries the Citizens Justice Committee wanted to cross-examine.

They included P.G. Gavai, who was the lt governor and administrator of Delhi during the massacre, M.K. Wali, who replaced Gavai subsequent to the riots, and Subhash Tandon, who was the police commissioner of the Capital during the fateful period. It is self-evident that each of those high office holders were indispensable for the CJC to establish its allegation of complicity against the Government and Congress Party. The Commission admitted in its report that it was asked repeatedly to permit cross examination of those public officials. And it even admitted to have turned down that request simply because “it was of the view that that it would not be expedient to allow cross-examination.” Misra did not deign to give any reason for why he considered it inexpedient to allow cross-examination of those dignitaries who were best positioned to throw light on the CJC’s allegation that the violence was organised by the powers that be. His silence can mean only one thing: He knew that he would not have been able to exonerate the Rajiv Gandhi Government and the Congress Party if he permitted the normal procedure of subjecting all the witnesses, no matter how highly placed, to cross examination.

(3) Why do you think cross examining persons in authority should have been considered indispensable to the inquiry into the 1984 massacre?

(a) It is not just in the case of the 1984 massacre. Cross examination is a must for any inquiry commission as also for any trial court. Nowhere in the civilised world is anybody’s testimony taken to be true unless it has gone through and withstood the test of cross examination. If a witness is permitted to narrate his version without fear of cross examination from the other side, it amounts to giving him a licence to concoct anything with impunity. The rule of cross examination applies even to high office holders. That is why so many other inquiry commissions have subjected Cabinet ministers to cross examination. In the fifties, the then finance minister, T.T. Krishnamachari, was cross examined before the M.C. Chagla Commission probing the Mundhra scam. More recently, Cabinet ministers L.K. Advani, Murli Manohar Joshi and Uma Bharati were cross examined before the Liberhan Commission probing the demolition of the Babri Masjid and George Fernandes was cross examined before the Venkataswami Commission probing the Tehelka defence deal controversy. Needless to add, the cross examination of all those VIPs took place in public and the press could therefore publish their reports on the basis of first-hand information. But the standards adopted by Misra were rather different. He did not permit the cross examination of any of the public officials and, since whatever happened was all in camera, the question of the press reporting any of that did not arise at all.

(4) How did the Misra Commission react to the withdrawal of the Citizens Justice Committee?

(a) Misra made no bones about the fact that the CJC’s withdrawal was a blow to the credibility of his inquiry. While admitting that its withdrawal created “some amount of embarrassment in the working of the Commission,” Misra recorded his “disapproval of the manner in which the CJC withdrew from the proceedings.” But oddly enough Misra did not mention anywhere in his report a single line from the 18-page withdrawal statement of the CJC. Instead, he reproduced the contents of a letter the CJC wrote subsequently at his instance saying its withdrawal did not “in any manner imply a lack of personal confidence in your Lordship or any mark of disrespect for the Commission.” That was merely an expression of courtesy but Misra reproduced the letter in entirety, that too not once but twice. Clearly, he was seeking to salvage some credibility by clutching at that letter of CJC as evidence of his integrity.

(5) Were the victims left in the lurch because of the withdrawal of the Citizens Justice Committee?

(a) On the contrary, the CJC did a great service to the cause of the victims by recording in its withdrawal statement the farcical nature of the Misra Commission’s inquiry. If anything, the so-called findings that the Misra Commission came up with subsequently vindicated the CJC’s apprehensions about the object of the whole exercise. When the CJC withdrew on March 31, 1986, what was still left to be done was the last lap of evidence and then present arguments on the entire material recorded by the Commission. The Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee represented the victims for the remainder of the proceedings, for whatever they were worth.

(6) India is known for its free and vigilant press. Did they not come down heavily on all those dubious activities of the Misra Commission?

(a) No, they did no such thing when the proceedings were on. On the contrary, it was the Misra Commission that came down heavily on the press. For all the courage and independence the press displayed in reporting the 1984 massacre, and forall the service they rendered subsequently by keeping the issue alive, they somehow gave in at that particular moment to the bullying of the Misra Commission. The bone of contention was whether the press could circumvent Misra’s in camera proceedings and publish reports of the hearings on the briefing of unnamed sources. The controversy arose in the last week of January 1986 when the Commission came to the stage of recording evidence (meaning, when witnesses started giving their testimonies). The reports that came on the first two days of evidence were acutely embarrassing to Misra and threatened to give away his game of fixing the inquiry in favour of Congress leaders. On the third day, the Commission passed a gag order threatening to take action against newspapers that continue to carry reports on the proceedings. Misra succeeded in having his way with the press even though he had no authority in law to pass any gag order. No newspaper dared to test his claim or challenge his order. Misra rewarded the press with a dubious compliment: “The Commission places on record that the press has mostly behaved responsibly and was co-operative after the direction was given.”

(7) What was so embarrassing to the Misra Commission in the press reports tha came on the proceedings of the first two days of recording of evidence?

(a) The press reports inadvertently betrayed a conspiracy of “counter affidavits.”Out of a total of 2,905 affidavits received by the Commission, only 639 affidavits were filed by the victims or in support of them. The rest of the affidavits were all against the victims. The Misra Commission should have found it odd if there was even a single affidavit against Sikhs in the context of their massacre. Yet, there were about three counter affidavits for each affidavit filed from the side of the victims.

When the Commission started recording evidence, it summoned six to seven witnesses from each of the two sides. But as it happened, on the first two days hardly anyone came to depose from among those who filed the counter affidavits.

The ones who came either denied having filed those counter affidavits or ended up contradicting the statements attributed to them. Much to the embarrassment of Misra and the sponsors of the counter affidavits, these tell-tale developments in the in camera proceedings found their way into newspapers. The tenor of the reports made it clear to Misra that his cover up was in danger of being exposed if he did not immediately find a way to stop the press from reporting his proceedings. Hence the gag order.

(8) Could the Misra Commission not have decided to hold the proceedings in camera simply because the inquiry was sensitive and Punjab was then still wracked by secessionist militancy?

(a) First of all, it must be pointed out that even the Commission did not make such a claim about its decision to hold the entire inquiry in camera. In fact, it suppressed the fact that it had framed a rule at the outset stipulating that the proceedings would be held in camera “unless directed otherwise.” Instead, it made out in its report that it began to hold the proceedings in camera only after “wrong reports started featuring in the press” and “when evidence came to be taken, tainted news appeared with greater frequency.” Misra blamed the CJC for all those allegedly distorted reports without however explaining why the fourth estate in the first place had to depend entirely on the CJC for information. Misra did not want to admit that he had made up his mind to hold the inquiry in camera long before the journalists could have given him any reason to lose faith in their integrity or ability.

(9) What did the Misra Commission say about the many affidavits filed against the victims of the massacre?

(a) Misra did not discuss them at all. This seems to have been mainly to avoid mentioning that most of those 2,200 affidavits were stereotyped. The same set of assertions was repeated in many affidavits in more or less the same language. In fact, in a lot of those counter affidavits all that the deponent did was to fill his personal details with his hand in the blanks and affix his signature at the end. Not surprisingly, the stereotyped affidavits had no evidence to offer. They were low on facts and high on opinion: Their thrust was to make a bald assertion that the violence on the Sikhs was entirely spontaneous and not organised at all. But when some of those deponents appeared before the Commission in the first round of evidence, they repudiated the affidavits attributed to them and came out with shocking details of how some Congress members and other interlopers tricked them into signing those documents. This forced Misra to keep aside the counter affidavits for a good part of the inquiry. But he kept silent about all this in his report because it would have betrayed the fact that there was an organised effort before him to make out that the massacre was not organised.

(10) How could the Misra Commission have not seen the stereotyped nature of the counter affidavits as evidence of a conspiracy to shield culprits of the 1984 carnage?

(a) It of course did not want to draw such an inference because that would have knocked the bottom out of its so-called finding that the Rajiv Gandhi Government and Congress party were not involved in the organisation of the massacre. So, far from rejecting their authenticity, Misra pressed some of the counter affidavits into service in the last lap of evidence to give a clean chit to H.K.L. Bhagat, the most important Congress leader from Delhi alleged to have been involved in the violence. Why did the Commission at one stage keep aside the counter affidavits and why did it later change its mind and consider some of them? There is no answer to this vital question anywhere in the report. This despite its claim to the contrary in its report: “The Commission has dealt with these affidavits separately and for reasons indicated there not much of reliance has been placed on most of these affidavits.”

(11) If the Misra Commission exonerated the Rajiv Gandhi Government andCongress party, who did it blame for the massacre?

(a) It blamed the police and an amorphous, anonymous entity called “anti-social elements.” The Commission said that the violence started spontaneously on the evening of October 31, 1984 around the time Indira Gandhi’s death was announced. The violence intensified the following day, according to the Commission, for two reasons. First, the failure of the police to nip it in the bud.

Second, the entry of anti-social elements who converted the spontaneous violence into an organised attack. The highest office holder the Commission censured for negligence was P.G. Gavai, who was Delhi’s lt governor during the violence and was anyway sacked while the killings were still going on.

(12) Did the Misra Commission not consider the possibility of the police having failed to curb the violence because of pressure from above?

(a) The Commission gave a categorical finding that the main reason for the failure of the police was a communication breakdown. The police stations failed to convey to their control rooms or superior officers the magnitude of the violence taking place in their territories. Additional Commissioner of Police H.C. Jatav, for instance, told the Commission that he received information about Trilokpuri, the worst affected area in the whole of Delhi, only on the evening of November 2, 1984. Jatav claimed that there was an 18-hour delay in the communication even though Trilokpuri is barely 12 km from the police headquarters. Since the top brass was thus apparently unaware of the alarming proportions of the violence till a late stage, there was a delay in enforcing curfew and deploying reinforcements.

Again, because of this communication breakdown within the police force, the Commission held that there was no question of attributing any negligence, much less complicity, to the Rajiv Gandhi Government.

(13) What reasons did the Misra Commission give for the negligence of the policemen in the field during the massacre?

(a) Anything but pressure from their higher-ups or top political leaders. He had no proper explanation to offer for why the staff manning the police stations failed tocommunicate on time with their superiors. All he could say was that some of the policemen were evidently too distressed by the fact that Indira Gandhi was assassinated by two of their colleagues. But then that does not explain the instances found by the Commission in which the police either looked the other way or instigated the mobs. Worse, the Commission also found instances when the police, rather than nabbing the miscreants, disarmed Sikhs acting in self defence and arrested them on trumped up charges. To any reasonable person, such behaviour would have aroused the suspicion that policemen acted as henchmen of political leaders during the massacre. But the closest the Commission came to attributing the acts of omission and commission of the police to any interference was when it referred to “local political pressure.” Even then, the Commission refrained from examining the sources of that local political pressure.

(14) Who are these anti-social elements who are supposed to have on their own mounted an attack on Sikhs in the Capital on such a large scale and got away with it?

(a) The Misra Commission made no effort to identify the so-called anti-social elements although they were in its opinion the main culprits. In fact, the whole idea of passing the buck to unnamed anti-social elements seems to have been to deflect attention from the specific names thrown up by the victims and witnesses.

Misra simply said that the anti-social elements belonged to the poor sections of the population living in slums in and around Delhi. He also took pains to clarify that they did not belong to the Congress party and that is why so many victims found them to be, he said, in a jubiliant mood as they indulged in arson, loot and killings apparently in retaliation to Indira Gandhi’s assassination. The most Misra conceded was the likelihood of Congress workers joining the anti-social elements in the riots.

(15) If it acknowledged the role of Congress workers in the massacre, how could the Misra Commission exonerate the party?

(a) It had the gall to say that the Congress party could not be blamed for the very reason the Sikh community as such could not be held responsible for the action of two Sikhs who killed Indira Gandhi. “Every person who takes a dip in the Ganges is not purified. Similarly, everyone in the Congress (I) is not a Gandhi believing and practising non-violence. The party label, therefore, does not attract the party nor take away the individual element,” rationalised Misra. Even though he never called the Congress party for an explanation, Misra on his own took great pains to defend the organisation he was going to join in the future. He said:

“The Congress party at the lower level – like any political party anywhere – has loose ends and from the fact of participation of people belonging to the party at that level it is difficult to accept the stand that the Congress (I) party had either organised or participated as such in the riots.”

(16) What reasons did the Misra Commission give for finding the Congress leadership in general blameless for the massacre meant to avenge Indira Gandhi’s assassination?

(a) Misra made no pretence of arriving at that conclusion in the manner of a judge.

He dismissed the allegation against the Congress party without even feeling the need to call for its explanation. Going purely by his personal predilection, Misra gave a pseudo-scientific explanation for justifying his belief. Had the Congress party been involved, the magnitude of the violence, he suggested, would have been even greater and neither the police nor the combined defence of the local citizens would have been effective anywhere in Delhi. “If the Congress (I) party or a powerful force in the party played any role, neither of these two elements could have functioned in the manner each of them has been ascribed,” he said.

(17) How did the Misra Commission indict 19 Congress workers if there was no proper inquiry?

(a) That the Misra Commission indicted 19 Congress workers is a myth Congress leaders have been propagating to save their faces. Indictment suggests that the Commission had issued notices to those workers and considered the allegations levelled against each of them. In reality, he did no such thing nor did he even pretend to have conducted such an inquiry. He examined the subject only in terms of broad sweeps. Since he conceded the likelihood of Congress workers participating in the riots, he said he had “no particular reason to disbelieve the allegations so tabulated” against 19 workers by the Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee in its written arguments.

(18) Did the Misra Commission go into the conduct of the Congress party in the context of the massacre?

(a) Yes, it did, but only in terms of the resolutions passed by it at the Central and state levels. Thus, the Congress party got a clean chit because it had done its paper work alright. “In the face of these resolutions of November 1, 1984, by the Central and Union Territory party organs, it is indeed difficult to allege, much less discover, unseen hands of the party behind the violence perpetrated so dastardly,” the Commission observed. Misra set much store by the fact that several Sikhs belonging to the Congress party were also not spared by the rioters. On the basis of a highly questionable assumption, Misra said: “If the Congress (I) party or some of its highly placed leaders had set the rioters to operate, one would expect the Sikhs with Congress base and affinity to have escaped the depredation.”

(19) How did the Misra Commission exonerate H.K.L. Bhagat despite the fact that his constituency of east Delhi was the worst affected in the violence?

(a) Besides Rajiv Gandhi, Bhagat is the only Congress leader to have been specifically exonerated by the Misra Commission. Misra did this honour to Bhagat not only because he was the sole representative of Delhi in Indira Gandhi’s council of ministers. Bhagat was also at the centre of two conflicting sets of affidavits on his role in the riots. In fact, most of the 2,000-odd counter affidavits were filed mostly in support of Bhagat. In a manner that befits no judge, Misra chose to record evidence on Bhagat without issuing any notice to him. Bhagat on his part did not protest because he was probably had fore-knowledge of the outcome of the inquiry. Bhagat’s confidence was not misplaced as Misra himself came up with purely extra-legal arguments to reject all allegations against him.

For instance, noting the fact that some Sikhs had filed affidavits in his favour, Misra said: “If Shri Bhagat had indeed played the role of an organiser of the riots, it is difficult to find even a single Sikh supporter in his camp.” Further, in a gratuitous display of respect for Bhagat, Misra said he “being a sitting MP and minister was not likely to misbehave in the manner alleged… People of the Sikh community being electors of his constituency, Shri Bhagat, keeping the democratic politician’s behaviour towards the elector in view, was not likely to antagonise the Sikh sympathy towards him.”

(20) What exactly were the grounds on which Rajiv Gandhi himself was given a clean chit by the Misra Commission?

(a) While H.K.L. Bhagat figured in hundreds of affidavits one way or the other, there were only two affidavits pertaining to Rajiv Gandhi – and both against him. But the Misra Commission report had nothing but high praise for Rajiv Gandhi who took charge as Prime Minister within hours of his mother’s assassination. Without giving any indication of the source of his evidence, Misra recorded a finding that on the very night of the assassination, Rajiv left instructions to alert and, if need be, call in the Army. Holding that Rajiv took “all reasonable steps expected of him to meet the situation,” Misra said he even visited affected areas on November 2 against security advice and “boosted the morale of the victims.”

Misra therefore said that Rajiv’s peace appeals to the nation on October 31 and November 1, his condemnation of the riots “in strong terms,” his decision to sack Lt Governor of Delhi P.G. Gavai on November 3 and “the overall posture adopted against the mad crowd leave no scope to entertain the allegation in a couple of affidavits that he too had something to do to help the unseemly situation.”

SFI GIRL STUDENTS OF DURGAPUR GOVERNMENT COLLEGE BRING OUT A LARGE PROCESSION AFTER WINNING ALL THE 63 SEATS UNCONTESTED. IN RECENT TIMES MOST OF THE COLLEGE UNIONS IN WEST BENGAL HAVE BEEN WON BY SFI AND OTHER LEFTIST STUDENTS' ORGANISATIONS AGAINST TMC-CONGRESS-MAOIST-SUCI COMBINED FASCIST FORCE.

WOMEN OF DIFFERENT VILLAGES OF PATRASAYAR BLOCK IN BANKURA DISTRICT ARRIVE AT JADUBHAT MANCH AT BISHNUPUR ON 24-03-2010 TO LODGE COMPLAIN WITH THE STATE WOMEN COMMISSION AGAINST BRUTALITIES AND ATROCITIES OF TMC-MAOIST ALLIANCE OVER THEM. BEING WOMEN, MAHASWETA DEVI, ARUNDHARI ROY, MEDHA PATKAR AND OTHER SO CALLED INTELLECTUALS ARE SILENT. SHAME ON THEM!

The National Commission on Religious & Linguistic Minorities Leaded by Justice Ranganath Mishra former Chief Justice of India and Dr. Tahir Mahmood submitted its Report to the Prime Minister on 22 May, 2007 shall be formally released only after being established in the Parliament in the Monsoon Session relevant extracts of in terms of the Muslim Community an reported below. - Editor of Muslim India.

CRITERIA FOR IDENTIFYING SOCIALLY AND ECONOMICALLY BACKWARD CLASSES AMONG THE RELIGIOUS AND LINGUISTIC MINORITIES

16.15. We recommend that in the matter criteria for identifying backward classes there should be absolutely no discrimination whatsoever between the majority community and the minorities; and, therefore, the criteria now applied for this purpose to the majority community — whatever that criteria may be – must be unreservedly applied also to all the minorities.

16.15. As a natural corollary to the aforesaid recommendation we recommend that all those classes, sections and groups among the minorities should be treated as backward whose counterparts in the majority community are regarded as backward under the present scheme of things.

16.18. To be more specific, we recommend that all those social and vocational groups among the minorities who but for their religious identity would have been covered by the present net of Scheduled Castes should be unquestionably treated as socially backward, irrespective of whether the religion of those other communities recognises the caste system or not.

16.19. We also recommend that those groups among the minorities whose counterparts in the majority community are at present covered by the net of Scheduled Tribes should also be included in that net; and also, more specifically, members of the minority communities living in any Tribal Area from pre-independence days should be so included irrespective of their ethnic characteristics.

TERM OF REFERENCE NO. II (ORIGINAL)

MEASURES OF WELFARE FOR MINORITIES INCLUDING RESERVATION

GENERAL WELFARE MEASURES

A. EDUCATIONAL MEASURES

16.2.4 As the meaning and scope of Article 30 of the Constitution has become quite uncertain, complicated and diluted due to their varied and sometimes conflicting judicial interpretations, we recommend that a comprehensive law should be enacted without delay to detail all aspects of minorities, educational rights under that provision with a view to reinforcing its original dictates in letter and spirit.

16.2.5 The statute of the National Minority Educational Institute Commission should be amended to make it wide-based in its composition, powers, functions and responsibilities and to enable it to work as the watchdog for a meticulous enforcement of all aspects of minorities, educational rights under the Constitution.

16.2.6 As by the force of judicial decisions the minority intake in minority educational institutions has, in the interest of national integration, been restricted to about 50%, thus virtually earmarking the remaining 50% or so for the majority community – we strongly recommend that, by the same analogy and for the same purpose, at least 15% seats in all non-minority educational institutions should be earmarked by law for the minorities as follows:-

(a) The break up within the recommended 15% earmarked seats in institutions shall be 10% for the Muslims (commensurate with their 73% share of the former in the total minority population at the national level) and the remaining 5 % for the other minorities.

(b) Minor adjustments inter se can be made in the 15% earmarked seats. In the case of nonavailability of Muslim candidates to fill 10% earmarked seats, the remaining vacancies may be given to the other minorities if their members are available over and above their share of 5%; but in no case shall any seat within the recommended 15% go to the majority community.

(c) As is the case with the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes at present those minority community candidates who can compete with others and secure admission on their own merit shall not be included in these 15% earmarked seats.

16.2.7 As regards the backward sections among all the minorities, we recommend that the concessions now available in terms of lower eligibility criteria for admission and lower rate of fee, now available to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, should be extended also to such sections among the minorities.

16.2.8 In respect of the Muslims – who are the largest minority at the national level with a country-wide presence and yet educationally the most backward of the religious communities – we recommend certain exclusive measures as follows:—

(i) Select institutions in the country like the Aligarh Muslim University and the Jamia Millia Islamia should be legally given a special responsibility to promote education at all levels to Muslim students by taking all possible steps for this purpose. At least one such institution should be selected for this purpose in each of those states and Union Territories which has a substantial Muslim population.

(v) In the funds to be distributed by the Maulana Azad Educational Foundation a suitable portion should be earmarked for the Muslims proportionate to their share in the total minority population. Out of this portion funds should be provided not only to the existing Muslim institutions but also for setting up new institutions from nursery to the highest level and for technical and vocational education anywhere in India but especially in the Muslim concentration areas.

(vi) Anganwaris, Navoday Vidyalayas and other similar institutions should be opened under their respective schemes especially in each of the Muslim-concentration areas and Muslim families be given suitable incentives to send their children to such institutions.

16.2.9 As regards the linguistic minorities, we recommend the following measures:-

(a) The law relating to the Linguistic Minorities Commissioner should be amended so as to make this office responsible for ensuring full implementation of all the relevant Constitutional provisions for the benefit of each such minority in all the States and Union Territories.

(b) The three-language formula should be implemented everywhere in the country making it compulsory for the authorities to includes in it the mother-tongue of every child – including, especially, Urdu and Punjabi – and all necessary facilities, financial and logistic, should be provided by the State for education in accordance with this dispensation.

B. ECONOMIC MEASURES

16.2.10 As many minorities groups specialize in certain household and small scale industries, we recommend that an effective mechanism should be adopted to work for the development and modernization of all such industries and for a proper training of artisans and workmen among the minorities – especially among the Muslims among whom such industries, artisans and workmen are in urgent need of developmental assistance.

16.2.11 As the largest minority of the country, the Muslims, as also some other minorities have a scant or weak presence in the agrarian sector, we recommend that special schemes should be formulated for the promotion and development of agriculture, agronomy and agricultural trade among them.

16.2.12 We further recommend that effective ways should be adopted to popularise and promote all the self-employment and income-generating schemes among the minorities and to encourage them to benefit form such schemes.

16.2.13 We recommend that the rules, regulations and processes of the National Minorities Development and Finance Corporation be overhauled on a priority basis – in the light of the recent report recently submitted by the NMDF Review Committee and in consultation with the National Commission for Minorities – with a view to making it more efficient, effective and far-reaching among the minorities.

16.2.14 We further recommend that a 15% share be earmarked for the minorities – with a break-up of 10% for the Muslim (commensurate with their 73% share of the former in the total minority population at the national level) – and 5% for the other minorities in all government schemes like Rural Employment Generation Programme, Prime Minister’s Rozgar Yojna, Grameen Rozgar Yojna, etc.

RESERVATION

16.2.15 Since the minorities – especially the Muslims – are very much under-represented, and sometimes wholly unrepresented, in government employment, we recommend that they should be regarded as backward in this respect within the meaning of that term as used in Article 16 (4) of the Constitution – notably without qualifying the word ‘backward’ with the words “socially and educationally” – and that 15% of posts in all cadres and grades under the Central and State Governments should be earmarked for them as follows:-

(a) The break up within the recommended 15% shall be 10% for the Muslims (commensurate with their 73% share of the former in the total minority population at the national level) and the remaining 5% for the other minorities.

(b) Minor adjustment inter se can be made within the 15% earmarked seats. In the case of non-availability of Muslims to fill 10% earmarked seats, the remaining vacancies may be given to other minorities if their members are available over and above their share of 5%; but in no case shall any seat within the recommended 15% go to the majority community.

16.2.16 Should there be some insurmountable difficulty in implementing thisrecommendation, as an alternative we recommend that since according to the Mandal Commission Report the minorities constitute 8.4% of the total OBC population, in the 27% OBC quota an 8.4% sub-quota should be earmarked for the minorities with an internal breakup of 6% for the Muslims (commensurate with their 73% share in the total minority population at the national level) and 2.4% for the other minorities with minor adjustment inter se in accordance with population of various minorities in various States & UTs.

16.2.17 We further recommend that the reservation now extended to the Scheduled Tribes, which is a religion-neutral class, should be carefully examined to assess the extent of minority presence in it and remedial measures should be initiated to correct the imbalance if any.

16.2.18 We recommend that the judicial reservation recently expressed in several case about the continued inclusion of the creamy layer in various classes enjoying reservation, inclusive of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, should be seriously considered for acceptance as a State policy.

ADDITIONAL TERM OF REFERENCE

PARA 3 OF THE CONSTITUTION (SCHEDULED CASTES) ORDER 1950.

16.3.4 We recommend that Para 3 of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order 1950 – which originally restricted the Scheduled Caste net to the Hindus and later opened it to Sikhs and Buddhists, thus still excluding from its purview the Muslims, Christians, Jains and Parsis, etc. – should be wholly deleted by appropriate action so as to completely de-link Scheduled Caste status from religion and make the Scheduled Castes net fully religion-neutral like that of the Scheduled Tribes.

16.3.5 We further recommend that all those groups and classes among the Muslims and Christians, etc. whose counterparts among the Hindus, Sikhs or Buddhists, are included in the Central or State Scheduled Castes lists should also be covered by the Scheduled Caste net. If any such group or class among the Muslims and Christians, etc. is now included in an OBC list, it should be deleted from there while transferring it to the Scheduled Castes.

16.3.6 We further recommend that as the Constitution of India guarantees freedom of conscience and religious freedom as a Fundamental Right, once a person has been included in a Scheduled Caste list a willful change of religion on his part should not effect adversely his or her Scheduled Caste status.

TERM OF REFERENCE NO. III (ORIGINAL)

MODALITIES FOR IMPLEMENTING OUR RECOMMENDATIONS

16.4.2 We recommend that all Central and State Acts, Statutory Rules and Regulations be suitably amended to implement those of our recommendations which in the opinion of the Ministry of Law and Justice or any another concerned authority may require such amendments.

16.4.3 We recommend the following legislative actions which in our opinion are required either for the implementation of some of our recommendations stated above or otherwise in the interest of the welfare of minorities:-

(a) Enactment of a detailed law to enforce the dictates Article 30 of the Constitution;

(b) Amendment of the National Commission for Backward Classes Act 1993;

(c) Amendment of the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order 1950 and the Constitution (Scheduled Tribes) Order 1951 as also of the Central and State lists of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes;

(d) Review of the laws and rules, processes and procedures, relating to selection and notification of OBC at the Central and State levels:-

(e) Enactment of a law to clothe with statutory status and judicial enforceability the Prime Minister’s 15-Point Programme for Minorities 1983 as modified in 2006;

(f) Amendment of the National Commission for Minorities Act 1992 and the National Commission for Educational Institutions Act 2004 so as to make it necessary for the government to appoint as the chairpersons and members of these bodies – through a Search Committee as in the case of the National Human Rights Commission – only reputed experts in the constitutional, legal, educational and economic matters relating to the minorities;

(g) Necessary amendments in the Wakf Act 1993 and all the Rules framed under its provisions;

(h) Review and necessary overhaul of the laws, rules, regulations, procedures and processes relating to the National Minorities Development and Finance Corporation and the Maulana Azad Education Foundation.

16.4.4 We recommend the following administrative measures which in our opinion are required either for the implementation of some or our recommendations or otherwise in the interest of the welfare of minorities:—

(a) Establishment of a Parliamentary Committee to consider and decide in the light of the Constitution policy matters relating to the minorities;

(b) Establishment of a National Committee consisting of Chairpersons of NHRC, NCW, NCBC, NCSC, NCM, NCMEI, NMDFC, CLM, Central Wakf Council and Maulana Azad Foundation along with nominated experts for monitoring the educational and economic development of he minorities;

(c) Creation of similar bodies in all the States/UTs for the same purpose and consisting of local top-level officials dealing with minority-related matters and independent experts;

(d) Establishment of a National-level Coordination Committee consisting of representatives of all the nationalized banks and other financial institutions to work under the RBI for monitoring credit flow to the minorities;

(e) Establishment of State Minorities Commission and Minority Welfare Departments in all those States and UTs where these do not exist as of now;

(f) Decentralization of all minority-related schemes, programmes and plans so as to create suitable district-level mechanisms for their day-to-day implementation;

(g) Revision of the list of Minority Concentration Districts as suggested by the NCM in 1990s and initiating special educational, economic and general welfare measures there through the local administration;

(h) Appointment of Minority Welfare Committees consisting of official and local experts in all districts of the country to act as the nodal agencies of NCM, State Minorities Commission and all other Central and State-level bodies working for the minorities.

MALALA YOUSAF ZAI

‎"I dont mind if I have to sit on floor at school. All I want is education. And I am afraid of no one."

JUSTICE MARKENDEY KATJU'S OPINION ABOUT MAMATA BANERJEE

“She is totally undeserving to be a political leader in a democratic country like India since she has no respect for constitutional and civil rights of citizens and is totally dictatorial, intolerant and whimsical in her behaviour.”

– Justice Markendey Katju, Chairman, Press Council of India

MAOISTS SERVE INDIAN RULING CLASS

KISHEN JI, AN ANTI-NATIONAL

MAOISTS ARE AGENTS OF INDIAN RULING CLASS

MEDIA IN WEST BENGAL

“Politics, Journalism, and Big Business work hand in hand for the hoodwinking of the public and the plundering of labour.” (Upton Sinclair/The Brass Check (1919))